The State of the Union: A handy benchmark for immigration reform

President Barack Obama is expected to make immigration the centerpiece of his annual State of the Union address Tuesday, but it will hardly be the first time the topic has come up.

In the past 18 years, immigration has been discussed a dozen times in the president's annual speech to Congress, including three out of four of Obama's previous addresses.

That makes it a useful benchmark for how much the political environment has changed.

President Bill Clinton used harsh rhetoric and promised to crack down on illegal immigration, while George W. Bush called for a guest-worker program and disavowed amnesty for undocumented immigrants already here.

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To date, Obama has mentioned the issue only briefly, mostly avoiding specifics while calling for Congress to take action on a comprehensive plan and allow undocumented immigrants brought here as children to become citizens.

He'll likely abandon that approach on Tuesday to outline general principles that would include a broader path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, showing how much the policy discussion has changed.

Below, a closer look at what recent presidents have said about immigration in their State of the Union addresses.

Clinton: 'A nation of laws'

Although President Ronald Reagan signed an immigration overhaul in 1986, the issue never came up in his speeches to Congress or in any of President George H.W. Bush's four addresses.

Clinton first talked about it in 1995, when there were estimated to be about 5.8 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S., roughly half the number today.

Clinton took a harsh tone, arguing that Americans were "rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country." He promised to strengthen border security, deport undocumented immigrants who committed crimes and identify them in the workforce.

"We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws," he said, to sustained applause. "It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it."

Clinton repeated much the same language in the following year's address -- including the phrase "a nation of laws" -- and announced he would sign an executive order barring federal contracts to businesses that hire illegal immigrants. But he added a conciliatory line about honoring "every legal immigrant here, working hard to be a good citizen."

Clinton: 'A responsibility to enter the mainstream'

In his 1999 and 2000 State of the Union speeches, Clinton took a different tack, avoiding the issue of illegal immigration.

Instead, he argued that legal immigrants "have a responsibility to enter the mainstream of American life" and called for more funding for programs to help them become American citizens.

"We should do more to help new immigrants to fully participate in our community," he said in 2000. "That's why I recommend spending more to teach them civics and English."

Bush: 'Honest and orderly system'

Toward the end of his first term, President George W. Bush returned to the topic of immigration, calling in his 2004 address for a temporary-worker program that would "match willing foreign workers with willing employers when no Americans can be found to fill the job."

Bush argued that an "honest and orderly system" would help the economy and allow the Border Patrol to focus on more serious threats, but he drew a bright line on how to handle undocumented immigrants already in the country, then estimated to number about 10.3 million.

"I oppose amnesty, because it would encourage further illegal immigration and unfairly reward those who break our laws," he said. "My temporary-worker program will preserve the citizenship path for those who respect the law while bringing millions of hard-working men and women out from the shadows of American life."

Bush repeated that same message in his 2005 and 2006 addresses in a more abbreviated argument.

"It is time for an immigration policy that permits temporary-guest workers to fill jobs Americans will not take, that rejects amnesty, that tells us who is entering and leaving our country, and that closes the border to drug dealers and terrorists," he said in 2005.

Facing a newly Democratic Congress in 2007, Bush made the case for a temporary-worker program at more length, including his first reference in a State of the Union to what should happen to undocumented immigrants already in the country. Though he still rejected amnesty, he took a more conciliatory tone.

"We need to resolve the status of the illegal immigrants who are already in our country without animosity and without amnesty," he said.

He again made the argument in his 2008 address.

"We must also find a sensible and humane way to deal with people here illegally. Illegal immigration is complicated, but it can be resolved," he said.

Obama: 'Our broken immigration system'

Obama did not mention immigration in his first joint address to Congress in 2009, which focused on the major economic crisis then going on.

When he first talked about the issue in his 2010 address, the passage was vague enough that it could have been said by either of his predecessors.

"We should continue the work of fixing our broken immigration system, to secure our borders and enforce our laws and ensure that everyone who plays by the rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation," he said.

His 2011 State of the Union took the issue on more directly, including a reference to addressing "the millions of undocumented workers who are now living in the shadows."

He also made the first reference to younger immigrants, including a nod to the DREAM Act, which would allow undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children to become citizens if they go to college or join the military and have not committed any crimes.

"Let's stop expelling talented, responsible young people who could be staffing our research labs or starting a new business, who could be further enriching this nation," he said.

As he ran for re-election in 2012, Obama argued that the border was more secure and called again for a comprehensive immigration overhaul. He also explicitly promised to sign the DREAM Act, the first reference to any path to citizenship in a recent State of the Union.

"If election-year politics keeps Congress from acting on a comprehensive plan, let's at least agree to stop expelling responsible young people who want to staff our labs, start new businesses, defend this country," he said. "Send me a law that gives them the chance to earn their citizenship. I will sign it right away."

Though Congress did not pass the DREAM Act, the Obama administration announced several months later a deferred-deportation program that allowed undocumented immigrants brought here as children to stay without making them citizens.

No one knows exactly what Obama will say in his next State of the Union about immigration, but based on his current positions it will likely go much further than recent addresses have.